3 'Aha!' Hair Moments That Changed My Life

When you’ve been natural for as long as I have, you experience more aha hair moments than you can count on one hand. Aha hair moments during your hair journey are when something you did, heard, or learned changed your regimen forever. My aha hair moments usually revolve around a technique or method that gives me even better results than I’m used to.

As a woman with tightly textured hair, a goal of mine is to style my hair in a way that shows off more of my true length. It can be frustrating when I think a style will look one way, but my hair shrinks when interacting with high moisture levels.

1. Skip a Step, Avoid Shrinkage

One night I was too lazy to retrieve my water bottle and spritz my hair while I was twisting it. My laziness led me to realize that if I don’t spray my hair with water when re-twisting at night, my hair will show more of its true length when I unravel them. This was genius! Each night for five nights I would apply a small amount of moisturizer, skip the water, and twist. Everyday my hair would stretch more. If my goal was elongated hair, it only made sense that I stop spraying my hair with water, as it would only reactivate my coils and cause my hair to shrink as it dries. Omitting the water eliminated lots of shrinkage over time.

2. Stay Twisted

I twist my hair every night and unravel in the morning to wear a twist out, but on days when it’s raining, every curly girl knows that this is a recipe for disaster. There was a really rainy week in the spring and I knew that if I were to take my twists down on a rainy day and then head to work, I would have a big poof ball on top of my head before I could even make my way to my desk. Humidity and moisture in the air are a deadly combo for a twist out. Day after day the weather was wet and for this reason I left my hair in the twists.

Finally, one morning I woke up to birds chirping and I just new the rain spell was over. The sun was shining bright and I could finally take my hair down and wear it in my signature style. To my surprise the definition in my twist out was so curly unlike anything I’d ever witnessed on my head. Because the curl definition was locked in so well, I was able to go to bed for three consecutive nights without having to re-twist my hair at all. The time-saving at night was a dream to come true.

3. The 8-Minute Detangling Secret

My last aha hair moment occurred while at the hair salon. During a visit to Oh My Heavenly Hair (OMhh) Salon in Brooklyn, Diane Bailey detangled all of my dirty hair in less than eight minutes, seriously. It felt like she hardly touched me at all, but yet all of my thick coils were completely tangle free. In disbelief of what had just happened, I asked Diane “How were you able to detangle my hair so quickly?” Diane explained, “I used a detangling cocktail made of water, conditioner and oil. This concoction moisturizes, softens, and adds the right amount of slip to your hair, allowing me to thoroughly detangle your hair pain free and quickly.” I was in shock. Prior to this moment, I would spend up to an hour in the shower detangling small, soaking wet sections of hair that had been bathed in slippery conditioner, but I never thought to mix the water with my conditioner in a spray bottle with some added oil and detangle before washing. In the video below, I demonstrate how I make my detangling cocktail.

Share some of the tricks, techniques, and tools that have changed your regimen forever.

Jenell Stewart, the founder and editor in chief of the award winning website KinkyCurlyCoilyMe.com dedicates most of her free time educating and uplifting women with natural hair by way of her extremely popular website and YouTube channel. Jenell has been featured in Essence Magazine, Black Enterprise.com, and starred on the Dr.Oz television show as a Beauty Expert. In 2012 she was named one of Essences top Instagramers and that same year KinkyCurlyCoilyMe won an award for “Favorite Website” of the Natural Hair Community.